Setting up and running the Maslow 4 firmware

Software Maslow Firmware
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This thread is an overview on running the Maslow4 firmware. It is VERY much a work in progress at the moment so by the time we ship kits things should be quite a bit tidier. Even easier, unless you want to do software development you should never need to do any of this. The Maslow4 boards will come pre-programmed, and when you want to update the firmware it’s as simple as opening the FluidNC interface and clicking on the new firmware file. All of this will be organized and documented.

Anyway, disclaimer aside, here’s how you can build the Maslow4 firmware from the source code.

We’re using FluidNC as the core which is a pretty incredible project. We’re using the ESP32 S3 which they don’t fully support yet so our fork is off of their S3 branch. It’s not the latest version so updating that is on the todo list.

FluidNC uses Platform.io to compile which is a plugin for VS Code. It basically replaces the Arduino IDE. I hated it at first, but I actually really like it now. The first place I would start with Platformio is to install it and build a “Hello World” program just to make sure that everything is working. Here’s a quick video on how to do that:

Once platformio is working you should be able to make a fork of the repo and open this branch here in GitHub: GitHub - BarbourSmith/FluidNC at Starting-fresh,-integrating-example

That’s the latest stable branch. I’m sure I forgot something, but that’s where I’d start.

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I found it a bit easier getting and building it like this since the name of the branch is kinda odd:

git clone https://github.com/BarbourSmith/FluidNC.git FluidNC-Maslow4
cd FluidNC-Maslow4
git checkout "Starting-fresh,-integrating-example"
pio run -e wifi_s3

Note: I have the platformio_cli installed only and it built to success.

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@md8n This is the thread you are looking for :grinning:

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Just walking through my experience with setting this up.

Environment:

  • Windows 11
  • WSL 2 (Windows subsystem for Linux)
  • Ubuntu 22.04 (in WSL)

VS Code insisted on installing the Platform.io extension in WSL:Unbuntu-22.04 - it would not give me a choice to install it to Windows. So rolling with that …

Set up Platform.io as per the video linked above.

Note that at the end of the video, where you create the test project, Platform.io insists on using a back slash \ in the path name to the project, even though it is going into a Linux folder, and then the project will not load. Find the misspelled project folder and remove the offending part of its name. I found this was easiest through Window file manager.

Now the project can be found and loaded into VS Code.

Next, Ubuntu under WSL has no access to the COM ports. However, there is a way to give it access. Follow this guide: Connect USB devices | Microsoft Learn

  • First download and install usbipd-win in Windows.
  • Then I needed to do a reboot.
  • After that I continued with the guide above, performing the Install the USBIP tools and hardware database in Linux steps (In Ubuntu)
  • Then back to a Powershell window (running as admin) in Windows to check for my ESP32 S3 device, and map its port through to WSL and Ubuntu
    • usbipd wsl list
      BUSID  VID:PID    DEVICE                                                        STATE
2-3    303a:4001  USB Serial Device (COM3)                                      Not attached
2-6    0c45:6a15  Integrated Webcam, Integrated IR Webcam                       Not attached
      It’s on COM3 …
    • usbipd wsl attach --busid 2-3
  • Then back to Ubuntu to run lsusb, which got me
    Bus 002 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0003 Linux Foundation 3.0 root hub
Bus 001 Device 002: ID 303a:4001 Espressif Systems Espressif Device
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 1d6b:0002 Linux Foundation 2.0 root hub

And there it is

And then finally restart VS Code (because I had rebooted of course). And lo and behold, it could find the device.

But…

It couldn’t Upload to the device. And there’s this warning:

Warning! Please install `99-platformio-udev.rules`. 
More details: https://docs.platformio.org/en/latest/core/installation/udev-rules.html

So back to the Ubuntu terminal to install the above rules. And then another reboot (although I probably could have just restarted WSL)

And after the reboot I had to open a PowerShell Window (as admin) again and rerun usbipd wsl list, find my device’s bus-id (it didn’t change), and then run usbipd wsl attach --busid 2-3
Got VS Code up again
… and I still can’t upload to the device.

So back to the udev.rules page and I because I do not run my Ubuntu VM as root I went and also ran:

sudo usermod -a -G dialout $USER
sudo usermod -a -G plugdev $USER

And this stackexchange permissions - Could not open port /dev/ttyACM0 Error after every restart - Ask Ubuntu

From which I tried: sudo adduser $USER $(stat --format="%G" /dev/ttyACM0 )

And it still wouldn’t upload, because VS Code is running in a Window context, not as my Ubuntu user. So also, as per this https://arduino.stackexchange.com/questions/47429/failed-to-open-dev-ttyacm0-port-busy I ran sudo chmod 666 /dev/ttyACM0

And now I could upload! … not quite … now I get

A fatal error occurred: Failed to connect to ESP32-C3: No serial data received.
For troubleshooting steps visit: https://docs.espressif.com/projects/esptool/en/latest/troubleshooting.html
*** [upload] Error 2

And poking around a few things I wonder if it’s because I’ve already flashed this particular ESP32-S3 with the .net nanoFramework.

So I get the other one that I bought, and go through the whole process again. And no success.

So then I wonder about trying the other USB connector to see what I get - getting desperate here. And, after all of the above rigmarol, it finally tells me that perhaps my chipset is different. And I go Whaaat?!? after all this time.

So I go through everything again, again, and finally I’m able to upload to the device. I’m going to have a lie down now …

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